In the 1930s and 40s, wireless 'was what television, the internet and the iPhone, all rolled into one, are today'. Empire State tells the story of Ernest Fisk, the man who led the Australian wireless company AWA in those extraordinary decades, and was managing director of the music giant EMI in London after the war. Fisk considered wireless ‘the greatest gift of science to Australia'. Its' possibilities were 'as great as the future of Australia itself. His story is about a technology that helped change the world, and the great global political shifts that turned this son of the British Empire into a citizen of Australia.

This program was written and produced by Professor Jock Given from the Swinburne Institute for Social Research. Tony Llewellyn Jones and Denis Moore provided voice acting. Guests on the program were (1) Professor Bridget Griffen-Foley, Director, Centre for Media History, Macquarie University; (2) Richard Begbie, historian, Historical Radio Society of Australia; (3) Dr Peter Fisk, physicist, and grandson of Ernest Fisk; (4) John Dougall, Executive Director, Amalgamated Wireless Australasia (AWA); and (5) David Moloney, heritage consultant.